5 ms·

A friend of mine was a nurse who worked in an ER. I expressed similar concerns of yours to her, "organ donor might mean that the doctors don't try and save me

A friend of mine was a nurse who worked in an ER. I expressed similar concerns of yours to her, "organ donor might mean that the doctors don't try and save me as hard because hey, good organs!" and she was emphatic that the doctors wouldn't do this. I think the worry is that even if the particular doctors in her ER would always try their hardest, there might be other doctors in other ERs who might not. What's difficult is that there's really very little way to truthfully ascertain if someone did in fact try hard enough. How do you really quantify effort? It's very similar to programming, if someone creates a bug was it an accident or was it on purpose? You'd like to believe that it was always an accident but you can never really know for sure. What happens when organ donation is seen as a moral imperative and only a few percent of people choose not to participate? Might doctors not try as hard to save them as "punishment" for being "anti-social" or something? There are a lot of thorny ethical questions surrounding organ donation, death, and drawing hard lines where things are squishy.

ceejayoz 11y ago
> What happens when organ donation is seen as a moral imperative and only a few percent of people choose not to participate? Might doctors not try as hard to save them as "punishment" for being "anti-social" or something? IMO, if you want to opt-out of donation, doing so should opt-out of the receipt of donated organs as well.
- msandford 11y ago
  Fair enough, though it's trivially gamed. Don't be an organ donor. Get sick and become an organ donor. Receive transplant. Go back on your organ donor status. The rules to more properly regulate this would be a total disaster and would ultimately end up screwing some people unjustly and giving others organs unjustly too. More what I was trying to talk about was the idea that organ donors and non-donors might receive different standards of care "because organ donors are better people" in a future where almost everyone is an organ donor and societal expectations have shifted significantly.
- petercooper 11y ago
  What about people who don't donate blood? No blood for them?
  - ceejayoz 11y ago
    No, I think that'd cross a major ethical line. First, there's not an ongoing, nationwide shortage of blood - we have enough of it, so people aren't dying needlessly because they can't get it. Second, requiring an invasive medical procedure on a live subject is hugely different to cadaver organ donation. We already have an ethical framework in which the government at least partially controls post-death use of the body - autopsies, regulation of burials, etc.
    - petercooper 11y ago
      I wonder what keeps US blood stocks healthy. Here in the UK there seems to be an alarming story every few months about how we barely have more than a few days' stock. Even just recently: http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jun/05/sharp-drop-new-blood-donors-uk-stocks-at-risk http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jun/05/sharp-drop-ne... .. no-one gets anything for donating blood here though, if The Simpsons is even slightly realistic (!) sometimes people in the US give blood for cash?
      - ceejayoz 11y ago
        > Here in the UK there seems to be an alarming story every few months about how we barely have more than a few days' stock. That's how they drive up supply. When it gets too low here in the US they'll actually use phone banks to call regular donors to ask them to come in. I'd imagine the UK has something similar. > if The Simpsons is even slightly realistic (!) sometimes people in the US give blood for cash? I believe it's illegal to pay donors for blood, but plasma donation can be paid. It's problematic. http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/05/blood-money-the-twisted-business-of-donating-plasma/362012/ http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/05/blood-mone...
kpil 11y ago
I think that one risk being a organ donor is quite the opposite: Over-treatment. It might not be in your best interest (a painless death) to be painfully cooled down by a freezer to reduce the fever that can occur after severe aneurysms - while waiting for the brain infarct that will induce a "brain death." The cynical might say that it's for saving your organs rather than for your survival, and it's hard to tell how much pain is experienced, but looking at the reaction of the body,it's apparent that it hurts as hell.
JshWright 11y ago
If an ER doctor is actively trying to save your life (i.e. you are an unstable patient in an ER), it is _very_ unlikely that they would have any idea if you're a donor or not.

ceejayoz 11y ago

> What happens when organ donation is seen as a moral imperative and only a few percent of people choose not to participate? Might doctors not try as hard to save them as "punishment" for being "anti-social" or something? IMO, if you want to opt-out of donation, doing so should opt-out of the receipt of donated organs as well.

msandford 11y ago
Fair enough, though it's trivially gamed. Don't be an organ donor. Get sick and become an organ donor. Receive transplant. Go back on your organ donor status. The rules to more properly regulate this would be a total disaster and would ultimately end up screwing some people unjustly and giving others organs unjustly too. More what I was trying to talk about was the idea that organ donors and non-donors might receive different standards of care "because organ donors are better people" in a future where almost everyone is an organ donor and societal expectations have shifted significantly.
petercooper 11y ago
What about people who don't donate blood? No blood for them?
- ceejayoz 11y ago
  No, I think that'd cross a major ethical line. First, there's not an ongoing, nationwide shortage of blood - we have enough of it, so people aren't dying needlessly because they can't get it. Second, requiring an invasive medical procedure on a live subject is hugely different to cadaver organ donation. We already have an ethical framework in which the government at least partially controls post-death use of the body - autopsies, regulation of burials, etc.
  - petercooper 11y ago
    I wonder what keeps US blood stocks healthy. Here in the UK there seems to be an alarming story every few months about how we barely have more than a few days' stock. Even just recently: http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jun/05/sharp-drop-new-blood-donors-uk-stocks-at-risk http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jun/05/sharp-drop-ne... .. no-one gets anything for donating blood here though, if The Simpsons is even slightly realistic (!) sometimes people in the US give blood for cash?
    - ceejayoz 11y ago
      > Here in the UK there seems to be an alarming story every few months about how we barely have more than a few days' stock. That's how they drive up supply. When it gets too low here in the US they'll actually use phone banks to call regular donors to ask them to come in. I'd imagine the UK has something similar. > if The Simpsons is even slightly realistic (!) sometimes people in the US give blood for cash? I believe it's illegal to pay donors for blood, but plasma donation can be paid. It's problematic. http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/05/blood-money-the-twisted-business-of-donating-plasma/362012/ http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/05/blood-mone...

kpil 11y ago

I think that one risk being a organ donor is quite the opposite: Over-treatment. It might not be in your best interest (a painless death) to be painfully cooled down by a freezer to reduce the fever that can occur after severe aneurysms - while waiting for the brain infarct that will induce a "brain death." The cynical might say that it's for saving your organs rather than for your survival, and it's hard to tell how much pain is experienced, but looking at the reaction of the body,it's apparent that it hurts as hell.

JshWright 11y ago

If an ER doctor is actively trying to save your life (i.e. you are an unstable patient in an ER), it is _very_ unlikely that they would have any idea if you're a donor or not.